iPodlounge Releases 2005 iPod Guide

An anonymous reader writes "The folks over at iPodlounge just released the 2005 edition of their buyers guide. The 10MB 100-page guide can be downloaded here."

Comments

Wow.

[InfallibleLies]

A 10MB advertisement that I actually clicked on and downloaded voluntarily. Then I read half of it. Then Acrobat crashed, so I restarted it and downloaded it AGAIN.

Wow. Those boys at Apple know how to sell iPods.

Re:Wow.

[Kris_J]

It's a bit ad-y, but it's still not a bad compilation of iPod stuff.

Read the article, it's not just about iPods

[EggyToast]

It's the entire buyer's guide. 100 pages of consolidated reviews of essentially every worthwhile, not-worthwhile, and worthless product available for iPods, from covers to transmitters to batteries to iPods themselves to whatever.

Yes, there's advertising involved, but looking at it, it reads like a review magazine. Any consumer review publication is going to appear like an advertisement -- they're reviewing consumer goods that you can buy based on what you're interested in, and give you the opportunity to be a discerning shopper.

Having access to a large file like this that you can essentially use as a reference, without needing an internet connection and a series of bookmarks is quite worthwhile. Perhaps not worthwhile enough to make headlines, but for anyone interested in iPod gear and opinions, the iPodlounge is really a great site and comprehensive. And no, I don't work there.

Criticizing something like this is sort of like criticizing Consumer Reports, or pretty much any review-only consumer magazine. Personally, I really like the website because although they, of course, like iPods a great deal, they're objective enough to be able to step back and look at things objectively. They're quite well known to give fair opinions on whether or not new iPod releases are worthwhile (they were quite upset at the lack of a dock and other goodies in the latest Photo versions), and their review of 3rd party accessories have the one thing that many, many reviews online lack -- the ability to compare to other products they've reviewed. So you can go there and get the full tables and comparisons for whatever you're looking for. It's even useful for those just looking for portable audio reviews, like portable speakers or headphones.

Re:Read the article, it's not just about iPods

[Anomylous Howard]

Actually Consumer Reports is very different from most "review-only consumer magazines". CR is non profit and accepts no advertising. It is excruciatingly fair, and objective. They do not accepts sample products to review. They purchase their products at retail (They often buy several samples of the same product in different parts of the US).

Most review magazines are just fan-boy pimps for the industries they cover. Even Major newspapers (Washington Post) will not print a strongly critical car review for of loosing advertising. CR does not operate like that.

Re:Read the article, it's not just about iPods

[EggyToast]

I know that CR is different, but I used them as a great example of an objective review source. Which I believe they are.

ipodlounge has many of the same qualities, though -- their ads are pretty much always things that they have tested themselves and like, they're not afraid to give something bad scores (including iPods themselves) and rate things on overall quality and price ranges. they even altered their scoring scheme so that things that got a rating of "F" were products that would either damage or harm your stuff in some way or another, so that people would be able to spot those troublesome items.

They're still aligned with iPods and Apple stuff, of course, but they're better than, say, something like "Official PS2 Magazine" when it comes to reviews.

Save large PDFs locally first

[Vandil X]

Then Acrobat crashed, so I restarted it and downloaded it AGAIN.

PROTIP: Save a large PDF locally and browse it with your standalone PDF viewer. Viewing large PDFs in a Web browser (via browser plug-in) is an exercise of memory management and patience.